


Shanghaied

by Avelera



Series: After Uprising [8]
Category: Pacific Rim (Movies)
Genre: Anxiety Attacks, Dissociation, Established Relationship, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Mental Breakdown, Mind Control Aftermath & Recovery, Old Married Couple, Panic Attacks, Past Abuse, Past Alcohol Abuse/Alcoholism, Past Brainwashing, Post-Movie: Pacific Rim: Uprising (2018), Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Travel
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-05-16
Updated: 2019-05-16
Packaged: 2020-03-06 05:02:41
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 16,484
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18844171
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Avelera/pseuds/Avelera
Summary: Years after Newt has recovered from his possession by the Precursors, and years after finally marrying Hermann, the two of them get stuck overnight in Shanghai, the city where Newt worked as Shao's Head of R&D while he was possessed.Newt insists he's recovered and that he wants to try to remember the good parts of his time there as a high-powered executive, but as the night wears on and he's confronted with the scene of his past traumas, Newt is brought into confrontation with a time in his life he had hoped to bury in the past.





	Shanghaied

**Author's Note:**

  * Inspired by [On the Subject of Alice](https://archiveofourown.org/works/15541701) by [IDoNotBiteMyThumbAtYou](https://archiveofourown.org/users/IDoNotBiteMyThumbAtYou/pseuds/IDoNotBiteMyThumbAtYou). 



> This story can be read as a sequel to "The Only Way Out is Down" or my "After Uprising" series. All that's required in either case is to know that Newt has fully recovered from his possession, his name has been cleared for the attacks, and that he and Hermann are now happily married. 
> 
> This story was inspired by the fic "On the Subject of Alice" by IDoNotBiteMyThumbAtYou, which I highly recommend. I hope you enjoy. 
> 
> SPECIAL thanks to alsobarebear and Laurasinele for the assistance in beta reading this piece!

_ Shanghaied: (definition) To shanghai someone is to kidnap or trick them into working for you. The traditional way to shanghai someone is to drug him and put him on a ship. When the person wakes up, he better get to work. ... The shanghaied person would wake up and find himself at sea, often on a long trip like to Shanghai, China._

* * *

Newt’s leg bounced as he sat in the narrow airport seat by their gate, waiting for Hermann to come back. Of-fucking- _course_  their flight got delayed in Shanghai, of all places. He  _knew_  they should have sprung for the non-stop from Boston to Melbourne but Hermann, the perennial nit-picker over  _unnecessary cost_  had pointed out that it was ‘quite  _unfair_ ’ to ask the conference to pay an extra couple grand for their flights when a short, one-stop layover in Shanghai would drastically reduce the price.

“ _We won’t even be there an hour,_ ” Newt drawled to himself, mimicking Hermann’s accent. “ _We’ll not even see the place in the dash to our gate, pip pip, cheerio and all that rot._ ”

Sure, he’d agreed, but how was he supposed to know that Murphy's Law was in full effect? He'd been accommodating Hermann because he was  _nice_  like that. Now they were stuck here.

Newt tugged his rolled-up sleeves down to his wrists and had already buttoned his shirt to the top like a tool. It wasn’t like he was going to broadcast his, at this point,  _pretty famous_  tattoos for everyone to see, even after being cleared of the Tokyo attacks on the grounds of  _evil alien possession_. Especially not here, on what had been his home turf for ten years.

He’d pretty much begged Hermann to be the one to go up to the counter to reschedule their flight. He knew some of the airport staff here by  _name_ ,for fuck’s sake, what with how Liwen had him jet-setting all over the world to give investors presentations on Shao’s  _innovative new Drift tech_. (He’d always turned down offers for a hotel on those trips, opting instead for exhausting flights in and out on the same day. The Precursors liked to make sure he was home every night with darling  _Alice_.) The airport staff might  _recognize_  him if he was the one who went up. He didn’t want to  _be_  here and he sure as shit didn’t want to be fucking recognized by people who knew him during his douchebag Precursor days.

Newt curled further into his chair as a group of chatting flight attendants wearing the navy-and-red Shanghai Airlines uniform passed by. Shit, he  _definitely_  knew some of those faces. Maybe he'd get lucky and they wouldn’t recognize him without the shades and the stupid suits, like he was Clark Kent or something.

This whole place was a nightmare on his nerves. Too familiar, even if he’d always seen it through the haze of the Precursors' control, like watching the world from somewhere behind his own eyeballs. He could probably navigate Pudong Airport blindfolded and kinda wished he could just play blind now, and let Hermann steer him from Point A to Point B. He’d almost asked, until they’d landed and found out their goddamn flight was delayed, then delayed again, and again, and then finally…

“It’s been canceled,” Hermann sighed as he limped back to Newt’s side. “I’m afraid we’re here for the night.”

“Son of a  _bitch_ ,” Newt swore under his breath and looked pleadingly up at Hermann. “Did you flash the platinum membership like I told you?”

“Yes, much good it did us,” Hermann said. “Storm warnings. The next flight isn’t until tomorrow.”

“What if we switch airlines? Or take a bus? Or a boat? There’s got to be something we can do besides sit here all night,” Newt whined.

“What part of  _storm warnings_  did you miss _?_  No one is going in or out. Just our luck we’re headed to that blasted continent during once-in-a-lifetime electrical storms.” Hermann winced as he took the seat beside Newt and stretched out his leg as he slumped into the chair and place his hand on Newt’s. “It’s not all bad, darling. It seems the miles you’ve earned were good for something.”

Hermann held out a pile of printouts that had been clutched in his other hand. Newt accepted the sweat-stained, crumpled pages and gave a low whistle as he read. “The Ritz?  _Nice_. Shao used to put the important clients up there. Those are pretty sweet digs.”

Hermann gave a thin smile. "There are other options. We can also stay in the airport hotel if you prefer. I know your time in Shanghai wasn’t exactly, err…”

“Nah, man, we have to do the Ritz, are you kidding?” Newt straightened in his chair. “You gotta enjoy the perks, right? I sure as hell earned them after racking up all those miles.”

Hermann brightened. “Very well. I confess I wasn’t looking forward to a night stuck in a hotel. Perhaps we can see some of the sights if you’re up to it? Maybe grab a nice dinner if there’s somewhere you recommend?”

“You askin’ me out on a date, Dr. Gottlieb?”

“Much more than that,” Hermann said haughtily. “If I play my cards right, I hope to bring you back to my hotel after.”

“You mean _our_  hotel.”

“Who said the room was for you as well? I arranged for  _you_  to be housed in the motel down the street.”

Newt’s grinned and jabbed an elbow lightly at Hermann’s arm before he hefted himself to his feet. “Right, I'll get the bags, then let’s get the  _fuck_  outta here.”

* * *

Newt heaved their bags into the trunk of the cab and settled, red-faced and puffing, into the backseat beside Hermann. Why didn’t he remember what a pain in the ass it was to drag his luggage all over this gigantic, godforsaken airport? 

Oh, right. Because the  _Head of R &D at Shao Industries_ always had a driver to pick him up. Newt hadn’t even seen his bags from when he checked-in to when he was back at the front door of his penthouse.

A penthouse that was just down the street from their hotel.

Hermann was quiet beside him, busy flipping through messages and notifications that had built up while they were in the air, and the silence allowed Newt to sink into the leather seat and stare blankly out the window.

 _Déjà vu_  all over again. He remembered taking this exit off the expressway to get to the Inner Ring Elevated Road which would, in turn, take them down to the Bund. He remembered this view of the skyline from the road and, yup, goddamnit, their hotel was off the same downtown exit as his old penthouse.

Newt’s head felt cloudy, almost dizzy as he dully ticked off the steps of the trip, the landmarks he recognized. How many times had he suffered through this drive back from this airport, a hundred? A thousand? It almost felt like coming home, like he was just going back to Alice the way he always did, the way he always had to because they  _made_  him, and the last two years of living with Hermann, of being free and having his head to himself again was just a dream.

Maybe it was a dream.

A vague, sick feeling twisted in Newt’s stomach as they took the turn down the highway exit that also happened to go to his old place. Newt kept his gaze fixed studiously out the window as the sense crept over him that if he turned around, Hermann wouldn’t be there anymore.

His hands went compulsively to fix his tie. He’d loosened it on the flight but it felt wrong. It was unprofessional to be disheveled like this. His shirt wasn’t even ironed. Liwen would pitch a fit if her goons caught him looking like a slob. The ring on his left ring finger felt wrong, thin and gold, too simple for the  _look_  he’d cultivated. He was supposed to be the devil-may-care executive, all flash and oozing charm, meant to excite investors into believing that he was the genius that was going to make them billions.

Fuck, did he have another meeting tonight? All he wanted to do was go home and sit in his chair and get the Pons on his head so for just a few hours he could feel  _good_.

The car stopped. Newt frowned and blinked up at the lights of the portico. They’d gone to the wrong address. This wasn’t his place. Maybe Liwen had given the driver instructions to bring him to the next meeting without telling him. Newt’s jaw tightened in irritation. He’d at least wanted to stop by the penthouse, just for a second, just to freshen up, maybe get another hit of  _Alice_ and a few goddamn seconds to himself….

“Newton?”

Newt jerked awake as the door opened and he was staring up at Hermann. Hermann with his broad, lopsided mouth and grandpa clothes and his constant fussing over Newt. Only he wasn’t fussing now. Hermann was frowning down at him and offering his hand, the one that wasn’t on his cane. The bags were behind him. Had Hermann got them himself? That was supposed to be  _Newt’s_  job.

“Darling, are you alright? I called your name five times. I thought you’d fallen asleep.”

“Yeah,” Newt scraped both hands over his face and shook his head to try to cut through the fog in his brain. “Yeah, sorry, I was a million miles away.”  _And at least two years._

He felt better once they were in the lobby. Newt had been to the Ritz before to pick up clients, but usually, they went straight to the hotel bar or to back to Shao Industries. He’d never had a reason to stay at the Ritz, but one luxury hotel was like another. It was easy to forget they were even in Shanghai once the elevator doors closed behind them then opened again to plush carpets and a line of doors. He could finally  _breathe_.

“A bit ostentatious, didn’t you think?” Hermann scoffed as they found the door to their room, the ADA accessible one which was, as usual, near the elevator. “All that marble in the lobby must have been imported, and that ghastly chandelier….”

“You don’t have to do that,” Newt murmured. He stopped with his hand on the doorknob, the card key hovering over the lock. He turned back to Hermann. “You don’t have to pretend you don’t like it for my sake. I know you went to some fancy-schmancy prep school or whatever. This place is like coming home for you.”

Hermann had the good grace to look abashed. “Well, it hardly requires our Drift to know you’re uncomfortable. I’m sorry, I should have insisted we remain at one of the airport hotels.”

Newt waved the statement away tiredly. “S’okay, we’d just be stuck in our room if we’d stayed there, and it’s not like you knew where I lived.”

“I knew,” Hermann said quietly.

Newt paused and turned to stare at him. “What?”

“I knew. I considered visiting once or twice, even stopped outside the building before I thought better of it.” Hermann shrugged miserably. “I simply didn’t put it together with the location of this hotel. A foolish oversight. I should have checked a map.”

Hermann had come to his building? Hermann had stood outside, an elevator ride away from Alice, and the Precursors, and everything they’d planned to  _do_  to Hermann if he ever came over? Newt shivered as a wave of horror turned his insides to ice at the thought.

“It’s… it’s whatever, man,” Newt said. He flashed the plastic card key to the lock. The door opened with a click. He jostled the suitcases into the room and held the door for Hermann, but wouldn’t meet his eye. “It’s probably for the best you never came up.”

“Newton,” Hermann gently eased the door out of Newt’s hands and let it slide shut on its own behind them.

Newt closed his eyes as Hermann’s lips met his and it was nice, it was grounding. Hermann’s scent alone was enough to bring him back to the present. In the first months after he got his head clean, Newt hadn’t wanted to do anything but snuggle against Hermann for hours. It was the one thing that made him sure things were alright, that it was  _over_. The Precursors would have gone fucking ballistic if he’d ever tried to get that close to Hermann while they had a hold of him.

“We’ll stay in,” Hermann said with an air of finality once they broke apart, “order room service, draw the blinds and entertain ourselves. It was a mistake coming here. I should have listened when you said to take the direct flight.”

The offer was tempting. God knew, a night holed up with Hermann was one of his favorite things to do in the world. They could toss on some tv series and spend hours ignoring it in favor of necking. Then in the morning, Newt could stumble into the cab with his hands on either side of his eyes like blinders and keep them there until they were back at the airport. They could be in and out of this godforsaken city like they were never here and then never, ever come back again.

And then the Precursors would have won. They would have taken a whole city off the map for him, sure as if it had been wiped out by a Kaiju.

“ _Fuck_  that noise,” Newt said with enough vehemence that Hermann startled. Newt squeezed Hermann’s shoulder and shot him a cocky grin before striding further into the hotel room. It was plush as hell, all cream-colored silk bedspreads, and a giant TV. It would be a totally sweet love nest to cozy up in for the night, but it was not going to be this night.

Newt tossed open the curtains over the window to let the late afternoon sunlight pour in and almost gagged at the sight of the familiar skyline on the other side. Fuck, they were almost on the same floor as his penthouse,  _fuck_  they were looking in the same direction. Newt turned and spread his hands, feeling immediately better when the skyline was out of sight. “I know every classy bar and restaurant in this city, dude. We are going  _out_  and we are going to  _like it_.”

Hermann hesitated. “Are you certain? Really Newton, I know I suggested we go out, but I don’t mind relaxing instead. We’ve been traveling all day.”

“It’s barely six o’clock,” Newt retorted. “Come on, old man, let’s do it. Let’s have a night on the town. Then you can’t complain that I never take you anywhere.”

“I suppose an early dinner wouldn’t hurt…”

“Nuh-uh, nope. You can’t get decent food at this hour, man. It’s pre-gaming time, and I know just the spot. Get changed, put on your best digs, we’re gonna live it up!” Newt dropped down to unzip one of the bags and began tossing clothes onto the bed. The conference in Melbourne had listed a black-tie event so they weren’t out of luck. Once he found it, he tossed Hermann’s black suit and gray shirt he sometimes wore when he didn’t want to look like a fuddy-duddy onto the bed. “Put that on, come on, chop-chop. We've got places to be.”

Hermann grumbled something in skepticism but acquiesced while Newt turned to dig out his own clothes. The shoes he pulled out were polished to a shine since he never wore them anyway. He’d been on a steady clothes regimen of band t-shirts and skinny jeans since he got free and could dress himself again. It was time. It was the  _perfect_  time to show those bastards up. Hermann had picked out this suit for him to wear so it was dull, just boring gray, but if he jazzed it up with a silk shirt and a skinny tie, gelled his hair back he could be Fancy Newt on command, hell, he could be Rockstar Newt, maybe throw in some shades…

Newt shivered, his hands frozen half-buried in the bag. Right, no shades. He’d look like a douche anyway, wearing them at night. Never again.

* * *

The sun was tipping down towards the horizon by the time they stepped out. Hermann had insisted on a shower to get the stale airplane feeling off his skin while Newt waited, hopping anxiously from one foot to the other. His feet walked him without his brain even being conscious, and all the while he babbled to Hermann, pointing out sights.

“We’re gonna hit up the riverfront but see that cluster of ugly-ass buildings over there? Shao’s office was down that way, about a half-mile from my, uh, my apartment. Guess she wanted me close by. Can’t argue with the commute. The traffic here sometimes,  _whew_ ,” Newt said as he pointed down the long boulevard.

“I know where Shao Industries is located, Newton,” Hermann murmured. His eyes were shadowed as he studied Newt, only glancing briefly wherever Newt pointed before looking back. Occasionally he’d grab Newt’s arm to steer him away when he got too close to the road or almost walked into other pedestrians. “I have been there, after all.”

“Oh, yeah…" Hermann had been, alright, on the night of the attacks. "But hey, I bet you never got to see the sights!” Newt recovered. “I used to daydream all the time about taking you out to dinner here, and now I finally get to! It’ll be awesome!”

Hermann’s hand slipped down and found Newt’s. He squeezed it tight and when Newt looked over Hermann was  _watching_  him with that crinkle of sadness around his eyes that he got whenever Newt talked about their ‘time apart’, to put it euphemistically.

“Come on, don’t give me that look, man. It wasn’t all bad.”

Hermann raised an eyebrow.

“Ok fine _,_  it was _pretty_ horrific, but at least I got to eat at some nice restaurants on Shao’s dime,” Newt said. “And now I get to pass all that knowledge onto you! This isn’t  _sad_ , Herms, you’re… you’re  _rehabilitating_  these memories for me, see? We’re replacing them with something good! Now when I think of all those night’s out on the town, I’m not gonna think about being all fucked up and miserable. I’m going to think about how I got to party all night with the hottest guy on Earth and then how I got to take him home after and make out with him till dawn.”

“ _Newton!_ ”

“Alright, alright, we don’t have to stop making out at dawn. Geez, you’re insatiable.” Newt cackled as Hermann huffed in indignation and punched him lightly on the shoulder.

They found themselves down at the waterfront of the Bund with the Shanghai skyline stretched out before them. Newt made a beeline for the Hyatt, if they were quick they could catch the sunset from the Vue bar, one of the most exclusive in Shanghai and a favorite for high-value Shao investors. His hands had begun to sweat and he wiped them on his pant leg before he opened the door for Hermann into the glittering hotel lobby.

There was a line. Dammit. Newt cast about, his mind whirling as he considered options. Most of the places he knew well from his executive days had waitlists, he’d only gotten in because he had the power of a billion-dollar arms manufacturer behind him. He’d been a high roller. Sure he could name drop, remind the hostess that Doctors Gottlieb and Geiszler had a  _minor_  hand in saving the world, but his name was… eh, not quite as uncontroversial as it had once been. Even after he was cleared, there were still doubters. Especially in this town.

There were two options, as he saw it. He could give up on Vue, though at this point if they went looking anywhere else they’d miss the sunset, then find them some second-rate place for dinner and call it a night. _Or_ …

Newt bypassed the line, just walked right to the front, and leaned over the hostess stand the way he had a hundred times before. “Two guests for Shao Industries,” he leered.

It was easy. Too easy. His whole body slipped into muscle memory, into automatic  _sleaze mode_  like no time had passed at all. The hostess glanced up at him and waved the guest in front of him to wait. “Your names, sir?”

“Uh…” Newt panicked. He hadn’t gotten that far. “Geiszler and Gottlieb.” _Dammit_.

The hostess frowned. “I do not see you on our list. One moment, please,” she said and reached for a mobile phone.

“Wait! Uh, maybe we got the wrong place…” Newt tried but the hostess only smiled pleasantly at him and then began to speak in Mandarin over the phone.

“Newton, what is going on, did you just jump the queue?” Hermann said, appearing at his shoulder and casting scandalized glances back towards the line.

“Don’t worry about it,” Newt muttered under his breath just as the hostess put down the phone. Her expression hadn’t changed.

“Shao Industries has confirmed your reservation. If you gentlemen will please walk this way, the elevator will take you to the rooftop.”

Newt gaped then quickly closed his mouth and hustled Hermann along with him.

“You got us a reservation? That's quite thoughtful of you, Newton, but when on Earth did you arrange that?” Hermann said as the elevator door closed behind him.

“Uh…” Newt began, intelligently, when his cell phone buzzed. He held up a hand to silence Hermann as he took the phone out.

<Dr. Geiszler, I just received word that you have returned to Shanghai and you are posing as an executive of my company. As I distinctly, and with great pleasure recall firing you, would you care to explain to me what you are doing here? - Dr. Liwen Shao>

Newt swore under his breath. <Flight canceled. Stuck overnight,> Newt typed back furiously. He caught his tongue between his teeth as he typed. <I’m showing Hermann around and figured you owed me one after ten years of Hell. How do you even have this number?>

<Dr. Gottlieb is with you?>

Newt glanced over at Hermann. <Yeah, what’s it to you?>

<I see. In that case, inform your server that Shao Industries will be covering your bill tonight here and at any other establishments you visit.>

<A gift for your old head of R&D? I never knew you to be so sentimental, Liwen.>

<Do not be absurd. Dr. Gottlieb is a war hero and deserves every courtesy, which is extended to you as well only because he has grown so foolishly attached. That you are not in prison for sabotage and fraud is thanks to my testimony. I owe you nothing. Do ensure that he enjoys his evening, or I will know.>

“Foolishly attached? We’re  _married!_ ” Newt snarled down at the phone before he jammed his phone back in his pocket. Right, Liwen’s best friend-crush on Hermann had sprouted while he was still under Precursor control the day of the attacks. Liwen treated Hermann like her long-lost brother and Newt as his annoying yappy dog on those rare occasions they were all forced into the same room together.

Still, getting their expenses covered for the night was a pretty sweet deal, and Newt knew just the place to blow a few grand of an arms dealer’s money for the sole purpose of showing Hermann a good time. His lips curled upward at the thought.

“Two,” Newt said, flashing his fingers to a waitress when they stepped out of the elevator out to the rooftop bar. Hermann’s cane clicked as he came huffing up behind Newt. “And one of those patio couches overlooking the water, got it? Make sure it’s a good spot, Shao Industries is paying.”

“Did you say Shao Industries? What is going— what are you  _doing_ , Newton? Are you trying to run some sort of absurd scam?” Hermann hissed furiously as their waitress skittered off to clear them a table.

“Relax, babe,” Newt said. A weird sort of calm was settling on his brain. This was familiar, the kind of privilege that came with being a C-level executive at a billion dollar arms manufacturer. The only difference now was the quiet inside his head and Hermann beside him. He took out his phone and flashed the screen at Hermann. “Like I said, Liwen’s got us covered.”

Hermann gaped at the screen. “Absolutely not! Newton, under no circumstances will we infringe upon Dr. Shao’s generosity. Tell her this instant that we appreciate the gesture but we are perfectly capable of providing for ourselves.”

“Too late,” Newt muttered out of the corner of his mouth as the waitress returned to usher them to their table. Her expression had transformed into a bright smile just this side of obsequious, and Newt’s insides churned. He knew that look. It always showed up when the smell of money was in the air, when doors opened and chefs came out to thank their esteemed guests and top-shelf champagne appeared only to vanish into greedy mouths.

Out on the rooftop, multi-hued lights lit the plush couches overlooking the river and the view beyond. It was  _almost_ , but not quite the view from Newt’s old penthouse, but it hardly mattered since he’d  _been_  here, he’d sat at the round table not three feet down from them, surrounded by braying investors downing bottles of Cristal.

Newt could almost see it if he squinted. Himself, sprawled back with the shades on and the perfect gelled back hair, wearing a silk shirt and one of those sweltering vests, looking out over the water and knowing that when the Kaiju landed this city would be wiped off the map in a rain of fire.

Sometimes he’d go catatonic, just fade out into his own head. The Precursors were naturals at picking up the slack by then. They’d snicker through some gross misogynistic joke that made the male execs laugh while Newt would cringe inwardly and sip at the champagne that wasn’t enough to fuzz the feeling of the Precursors eyes on the back of his neck by then because his tolerance was too damn high.

“Gentlemen, can I get you anything?” a waitress bent over their table and Newt’s eyes trailed up to her and his mouth shifted without him really being in control of it into a leer.

“Sure thing, doll. How about a bottle of your finest red for me and these gentlemen?”

The waitress frowned. “Are you expecting other members of your party to join you?”

“Newton,” Hermann hissed beside him and just like that, the spell broke.

Newt froze then shook himself like a dog as he blinked up at the waitress. “Err…”

“I’ll have a lager,” Hermann said smoothly. “And my husband here will have…?”

“A vodka martini,” Newt croaked. The Precursors hadn’t liked him drinking anything stronger than wine or beer while he worked, and he'd only ever been here for work.  A thrill of recklessness shot through him at the thought. Fuck, he could order anything he wanted now, anything at all. “Straight up. Actually, make that a double.” His nerves needed it. His hands were shaking, he noticed vaguely, and he shifted them under his leg to hide them.

“Of course,” the waitress murmured and vanished back towards the bar.

“ _What?_ ” Newt groaned and turned at the feeling of Hermann’s glare. “We’ve had a long day, Herms, what’s wrong with having a drink?”

“I don’t care what you order, Newton. Within reason, of course. What I care about is that little display just now. You’ve been off in another world since we arrived. I don’t think this is a good place for you.”

“I’m trying to show you the sights, Hermann. Jesus, can you relax for ten minutes? I’m not made of glass,” Newt shot back. He swept his hand out toward the river below and the skyline dominated by the Oriental Pearl Tower. “Come on, look at that! The sun’s setting, the weather’s gorgeous, we basically got a free vacation and we’re having a night on the town in one of the coolest cities in the  _world,_  and Liwen Shao is paying! I’m not gonna let a bunch of alien bastards ruin it for us when they’re not even around anymore!”

“Liwen is absolutely  _not_ paying for us. We will cover our own drinks tonight and once we’re home I will send her a thank you card for the thought,” Hermann retorted. Newt snickered.

“Sure, good luck with that, dude. You can leave all the money you want but it’s gonna end up right back at our hotel in the morning in a nice little envelope delivered by a very scary dude. Just accept it, the money wasn’t going anywhere worthwhile anyway. Once an arms dealer, always an arms dealer, even if your bestie there had her ‘come to the good guy’s side’ moment.”

“She’s done enough for us already, Newton, text her back this instant and tell her…”

“Also, she basically threatened to kill me for real if I don’t show you a good time tonight, so can you try to smile or something, in case that huge sumo-looking guy over there is one of her goons?”

Hermann startled and glanced over his shoulder looking for the guy Newt had invented on the spot. Liwen probably did have a goon out there but for all Newt knew, it could be their waitress. Best to trust no one.

But the advice still stood and fuck it, he could take his own advice. They were at the top of the world, at one of the trendiest clubs in the city and they were there as VIPs. The waitress returned with their drinks and once she was gone, Newt leaned in and tugged Hermann close by his sleeve, kissing him for all he was worth and throwing in a lip-nibble for good measure just to embarrass the guy. They’d been married over two years now and Hermann  _still_  blushed whenever Newt laid one on him in public; it was hysterical, and Newt loved to watch him squirm.

Newt sat back with a contented sigh as Hermann sputtered, and picked up his martini, swirling it idly as he pointed out at the horizon. “Look at that, Herms, come on, cheers,” he clinked their glasses together. “Relax, life’s good.”

“Since when did you even develop a taste for martinis?” Hermann said as he took a sip of his lager, but Newt heard what he was really saying. The change of subject a peace offering, which meant Newt had won. He could afford to be magnanimous and he shot Hermann a grin.

“Never had one like this before, usually I get ‘em fruity, but I figure what’s good enough for Bond is good enough for me, right?” Newt said and took a swig.

Several minutes of coughing and sputtering later, Newt finally caught his breath and choked out, “Holy fuck! Dude, you could light this thing on fire!” Newt wheezed. He looked up at a sound from Hermann and realized the guy was  _laughing_  at him, literally doubled over with a hand over his mouth, red-faced.

“Oh, you poor thing,” Hermann snickered, not sounding sympathetic  _at all_. “Shall we get you something more to your taste? Perhaps a glass of milk or some apple juice?”

“Hey, fuck you, I can finish it!” Newt said and took another swig only to almost gag at the taste. Fuck, it was like drinking lighter fluid. “I can!”

“Certainly, darling, go ahead. I'll watch,” Hermann said and his eyes crinkled in amusement as he took a delicate sip of his own lager and looked at Newt over the rim.

“Yeah, well… shut up!”

* * *

The sun had set and the lights came alive like a neon sea over the river when they left Vue for the waterfront. Newt had a pleasant buzz going after choking down the rest of the martini, it had been a matter of pride at that point. He looped an arm through Hermann’s as they descended, nuzzling up against his shoulder. He giggled under his breath as he planted a kiss on Hermann’s neck while Hermann batted at him ineffectively and obviously didn’t mind.

“I know a place, a great place, you’re gonna love it,” Newt said as he raised his hand to signal for a cab. “Best food in the city, in the fucking  _world_ , you’re gonna…” He inhaled a kiss against Hermann’s lips and tried not to think about how the contact and the smell of him was the only thing keeping the distant buzzing at the back of his mind. He wanted to hold onto Hermann and never let go, wanted to anchor himself when every breath felt like he was slipping underwater, drowning.

“You’re sure?” Hermann murmured. Besides the snit over Liwen, he’d been super nice the whole night. Worryingly nice, like he expected Newt to fall apart on him again.“I’ve seen enough of the city to get the general picture. We could always return to the hotel now if you wish.”

“That’s boring,” Newt whined. “I don’t want to be boring. I know you don't believe it, but I used to be a hotshot here! I want to show you all the cool shit I know about. I wanna blow your mind, baby.”

“Newton, you were a  _prisoner_  here,” Hermann said quietly, and then added louder. “And I don’t need to dine at some flashy, overpriced restaurant to think the world of you. You helped  _save_  the world. Those establishments were enhanced by  _your_  presence, not the other way around!”

Newt closed his eyes and clamped his jaw tight to stop his lips from trembling as he pressed his face to Hermann’s neck. “Come on, man, let me show off just this once.”

“You show off all the time,” Hermann huffed just as the cab Newt had ordered from the bar pulled up in front of them. Hermann eyed it, then gave a sigh and let himself in.

“Ultraviolet,” Newt called to the driver as he scrambled in after Hermann. He grinned and settled in beside him before slamming the door and cozying up to Hermann’s side. As they pulled away, Newt leaned past him to point out the window. “You want the grand tour? We can go the long way and I can point stuff out to you, I’ll be the best damn tour guide you ever had.”

“Not now, darling,” Hermann said and before Newt had time to get annoyed at the dismissal, Hermann leaned close and cupped Newt’s face towards him, eclipsing his view of the window. “Just focus on me, alright?”

_‘Just focus on me, Newton. Focus on me,’ Hermann pleaded when the Precursors began another attack, banging on the doors of Newt’s mind, flexing his muscles against his will so his fingers clenched, so his spine arched and his breath came in short shallow gasps as they fought and spat and swore with his lips, snarling that they would tear him apart rather than let him go._

_Tears burned hot trails down his cheeks as his spine bent back and it took all his strength to move his chin down a millimeter, to nod at Hermann and keep their eyes locked through the assault._

_Bit by bit, the waves of pain had receded, the buzzing in his mind of a thousand furious voices quieted. He collapsed after what might have been minutes or hours into Hermann’s arms and breathed in his scent, clutching at his shirt as he shook through the aftershocks._

“I’m not having an episode,” Newt muttered sullenly. He pressed his face against Hermann’s neck.

“I never said you were,” Hermann said and with his palm guided Newt’s face up to kiss him full on the mouth. Every time Newt tried to pull away to see where they were, Hermann would pull him gently back. When they stopped kissing, Hermann held Newt’s head against his chest so his eyes were shielded and all he could do was breathe Hermann's scent through his shirt, until the car drew to a halt.

Newt’s brain was hazy as he pulled his face away from Hermann’s chest. Night had fallen and violet light bathed the street outside the restaurant. A line trailed partway down the block outside the door and the sight snapped Newt back to attention. He straightened.

“Alright, time to break out the big guns.” Newt cracked his knuckles and reached for his phone and with it the note from Shao and all the social capital it entailed when Hermann’s hand landed on his arm.

“You go inside and fetch us some drinks, I’ll put our name in,” Hermann said with a light push at Newt’s back towards the door.

Newt rounded on him. “Why? Dude, we can just walk right up. Forget the line.”

“Absolutely not,” Hermann hissed. He shut the door of the cab behind them and it drove off. “I was  _mortified_  last time. Liwen’s influence or no, we will queue like everyone else.”

Newt rolled his eyes. “This is ridiculous, it’s going to be murder on your leg to stand around like that, at least let me do it and you go get the drinks.”

“On the contrary, I’d like to stretch it out,” Hermann countered. “We’ve been sitting all day and there’s no reason for both of us to wait, and I  _know_  you. You’ll grow impatient in minutes and charge to the front again and I won’t have it, Newton, I will  _not_.”

Newt grumbled but knew the look when Hermann was being stubborn and had decided to dig in. It was either let him do a boring chore or gear up for one of their classic shouting matches, and he wasn’t sure he was up for one, not when his insides felt wobbly and his throat tight, like he was going to cry at any moment like a chump. The martini had helped calm him down a little, the buzzing in his head was quieter. He shrugged. “Fine, wait in the boring line. I’ll see you in a couple of hours.”

Hermann nodded stiffly but didn’t relent. They’d see about that. The line wasn’t moving and Newt bet it would be twenty minutes before stick-up-his-arse Hermann Gottlieb gave up and admitted he was right. Not that he did that very often, or ever really, but there was a first time for everything.

The inside of the restaurant was more like a nightclub than anything else, pounding music and neon lights flashing over the crowds at the bar. The dining rooms were separate and set aside, they weren’t kidding around with the three Michelin stars, but the bar was an experience in itself and about as swanky as it got. Newt squeezed into a spot as close to the door as he could find for when Hermann gave up, and ordered a couple of whiskeys, selecting out the brand he’d seen Hermann eyeing at Vue, ever the snob.

Some places never changed. Ultraviolet had always been a favorite attraction for clients visiting Shanghai and was by far one of the coolest places Newt had ever been allowed into, much less been treated like royalty. He found his spine straightening as the music washed over him, the atmosphere, the lights. Like no time had passed at all. The bartender nodded his head as he delivered the two drinks in cut crystal glasses like Newt was some kind of visiting prince. Newt picked up his glass and winced in anticipation of his first sip. Unnecessary, it turned out because the whiskey went down smooth as silk.

His head began to feel floaty again and Newt’s leg bounced, only once, before he forced it still. Couldn’t fidget. Couldn’t leave. Shouldn’t want to leave, this was the good stuff. This was as good as it got. Just like that, he was a hotshot again, a rockstar. Not the kind he’d ever wanted to be, but this was the place where he could at least pretend. This was everything he’d wanted: to be famous, to be special, and just because he got it by a different route than he’d ever dreamed, didn’t mean he couldn’t enjoy the perks, right? They got what they wanted out of him: Shao, and the puppet masters in his head. He could take five minutes out of all the misery to bask.

The music was too loud, pounding through his ears and down into his bones and as Newt sipped from his glass, his eyes wandered. The alcohol burned down his throat and pooled pleasantly in his stomach. He reached to take off his sunglasses so he could make out the shadowed denizens and keep an eye out for his clients, but they weren’t there for some reason. That wasn’t good. The sunglasses were important, he remembered distantly.

( _They_  didn’t like it when he forgot his sunglasses. Newt had an expressive face, one that gave him away in little twitches and lip bites and wide, terrified smiles in those moments when he remembered how well and truly  _fucked_  he was, when he couldn’t move or speak or  _breathe_  without them saying so, and people noticed. Even people who didn’t like him very much started to notice when he’d get that thousand-mile stare, those little flinches of panic and yearning to get  _out_. The sunglasses were a mask. A muzzle to silence a guy who could never stop talking, even with his eyes.)

Newt took a deep breath in through his nose and out his mouth and tried to steady himself. Why was he here again? He was alone in a sea of flashing lights and crowding bodies. Laughter and music combined and swelled. He couldn’t hear himself think.

He used to love loud music, the way he could lose himself in it, but he couldn’t afford that now. He needed to stay sharp and focused. His brain kept fading in and out. That had never happened before, not like this. Before  _them,_  he’d always had something to focus on, another experiment, another Ph.D., another cool thing he couldn’t wait to write to Hermann about or rub in his face. All his focus these days was to keep  _them_  from winning, but they  _were_  winning. They were always winning, and sometimes it was just easier to fade away. To set a mental bookmark to sometime in the future and zone out until he got there. Until he could sit down in the chair and put the Pons on his head and get a  _rush_  of Alice, the only thing that felt good anymore, like his brain was having sex with God.

He should blow this joint, just leave. He wanted to leave but he  _couldn’t,_ that wasn’t allowed. He had to stick it out. No weird outbursts, no slacking off work, no slacking off at all, ever, because he had a job to do, he had  _their_  job to do even if it was hell, even if it was murder, literally, millions would die even if Earth somehow rallied to save itself it might already be too late, they might already be too far along,  _he_  might have already done too much for them just by doing nothing at all but when he was good he got to feel  _Alice_  and this was just a small part, just a small cog in the wheel. Go out to dinner, make nice, hey at least it was fancy, right? At least he was being treated like a rockstar with dinners that cost more than his rent used to, with an entertainment stipend that was more than the whole K-Sci lab budget back in the day, and it was his to spend however he wanted, living large. Living the life. There had to be perks, right? He was allowed to have the perks as long as he was good, got to look around and see he’d made it, he was at the top of society before it all burned.

The room darkened around him. His elbows slid onto the bar and his fingers clenched in his hair, his arms on either side of his head blocking out the sight, the sound, the  _pulse._ It was too much, he wanted to be alone, he was always alone, they had made him alone for so long and he never got a fucking moment to himself they were always  _there_  and he hated it here, he  _hated_  he needed to get out, he needed to  _breathe_.

He just wanted to go  _home_.

A hand settled on his shoulder and Newt shot upright with a jolt, panic flaring in his mind and lighting up his alarms like fireworks. Like bombs. Like breaches opening all over the Pacific. Weakness. He couldn’t show weakness. He had to be normal, to force that toothy smile. When had he started crying? He scraped them away with his sleeve and the easy smile, the easy silent scream was back as his spine loosened and he sprawled casually in the barstool, got to be normal, got to be  _cool_ …

“Newton?”

Newt blinked. His mouth opened. His lower lip trembled. “Hermann?”

“I’m afraid they didn’t have a table for us,” Hermann said. His hand settled on Newt’s shoulder and Newt stared at it, uncomprehending as the warmth crept through the shoulder of his suit. Hermann was here. How was Hermann here?

His body began to shake.

“… And to be honest, the travel is beginning to catch up with me, what say we finish up here and be on our way. Is that my drink?”

Newt nodded mutely and passed the second glass to Hermann. Hermann took a sip, sniffing and then savoring the drink with far more expertise than Newt had ever been able to fake.

Newt finally found his voice. “W-We can’t leave.”

Hermann frowned down at him. “I beg your pardon?”

“Did you tell them Liwen Shao sent us?” Newt was up out of his chair, drink abandoned. He muttered to himself as he walked stiff-legged towards the entrance, “They’ll be so  _mad_  if we leave, the fuck was he thinking, can’t just  _take off_  like that, can’t just…”

There was a commotion behind him, the crowd was thick and out of the corner of his eye, he saw Hermann shoving his way through while muttering apologies and struggling to make room for his cane.

But Hermann didn’t get it. He never had. He’d stood in the same  _room_  with Newt and his eyes had skated right over Newt and the monsters in his head. Maybe he and Hermann barely saw each other these days, but what did that matter if Hermann was _safe_ , far away, except for the little rush of longing, the little rush of the  _missing_  going away for a few minutes, an hour, a day. It was like a single grain of rice for a starving man to get to see Hermann at all and all the while Hermann didn’t have a fucking clue what was going on, and never would, and probably wouldn’t figure out what had happened to Newt until it was too  _late_. They couldn’t leave. If Hermann was here in Shanghai that meant Newt had to play the  _role,_  or Hermann would be next. He couldn’t fuck it up, he couldn’t, or they’d hurt Hermann…

“Hey, asshole,” Newt said. There was some douche standing in the way of the host stand and he shoved the guy out of the way without looking to square off with the host, a middle-aged man with streaks of gray in his thinning hair. “Are you just stupid or did you not hear the part that Liwen Shao is paying?”

Hermann caught up and the host spared an unimpressed glance between Newt and Hermann. “Shao Industry’s money is no good here.”

Newt sneered. “Their money is good  _everywhere_. If Liwen wanted to, she could buy this place, fire your ass and everyone here, then bomb your restaurant to rubble just for the pleasure of watching it burn. Go get your fucking manager and see if there isn’t a table for us.”

“Newton!” Hermann was snatching at his arm, hissing his name furiously in his ear but Newt shrugged him off and leveled a smirk full of teeth at the host. The man hadn’t flinched and somehow that mixed with the rising tsunami of terror,  _they’re going to be so mad, so mad if I fuck this up_ , that brought anger which combined was almost as good as being high. He was floating somewhere above his head.

“I am the manager.”

Newt froze. At no point had the host’s expression changed. When Newt played the Shao exec card, employees scrambled, managers kowtowed and owners came out all smiles and wringing hands, ready to please.  But this man’s face remained impassive. It was going all wrong.

“Fine. Fine, I see how it is. How much?” Newt hands shook as he reached into his inner jacket pocket and drew out his wallet. Shao would reimburse him later, but he had enough cash to throw around to fix this. He had to fix this.

“I’m afraid if you’re associated with Shao Industries, your money is no good either, sir,” the host said. “Some things in life are more important than providing entertainment to an arms dealer.”

Newt’s mouth opened, then he frowned. This wasn’t right. This wasn’t the script.

Hermann shoved his arm, spinning Newt around, his face creased with worry and anger. “Newton,  _what are you doing?_ ”

“I…” Newt looked around helplessly. The manager looked on, impassive. An arms dealer. That’s right, Liwen Shao was an  _arms dealer_. Newt  _hated_ her. He would have hated working for her even without the Precursors, even without The Plan. He hated everything she  _stood_  for.

What was he  _doing?_  Shouting at this man for telling a Shao exec to go fuck himself? He should have been buying this guy a drink!

And Hermann… Hermann was staring at Newt like he’d never seen him. Like he had the day the Precursors had spoken out of his mouth and told Hermann they were going to destroy the world. Only this was worse. This was  _him_. Acting like an asshole even thoughthe Precursors were gone, even though his head was silent. What the fuck was wrong with him? Why was he like this, what had they  _done_  to him, why wasn’t he getting  _better_ , _why…?_

He was going to throw up.

Newt slammed a hand over his mouth and, head down, pushed his way to the door. Hermann was shouting behind him, impossible to hear over the pounding music, he could smell whiskey rising with the bile at the back of his throat, burning his sinuses. The fragile, shaky feeling like his insides were made of crushed glass was back, and he realized he was going to cry as he burst out into the violet-hued night.

Strangers crowded the sidewalk outside, waiting to get in. Shanghai spread out before him like an earthbound constellation, spiraling lights, and glittering buildings, their reflections floating on the river. It was beautiful and the air was warm and smelled of jasmine, and he turned and heaved every drop of booze in his stomach into the gutter. It  _burned_  and tears stung his eyes as Newt wiped his mouth on the back of his hand looked around in a daze.

“Newton!” Warm arms locked around him and faces were flashing in front of his eyes, drawing back in disgust from him, in anger. There were voices shouting and Hermann was there, pulling a white handkerchief from his breast pocket and dabbing at Newt’s mouth. “What has gotten into you, what is going  _on?_ ”

Newt stared. His vision was blurry but when he blinked it cleared and fresh drops of moisture crawled down his face into his collar. Hermann’s expression softened from severe to concerned in a blink. “Is this about the Precursors?” Hermann looked past Newton to the door of Ultraviolet and back. “Is this one of the places where they took you? Newton, why didn’t you  _tell me?_ ”

“It’s not like that,” Newt gasped. The tears kept falling even as he choked trying to stop them. “This was the good part. This was supposed to be the  _good_  part, you weren’t supposed to—”  _see._

Hermann’s hands cupped his face, his eyes searching Newt’s. Once, his glasses would have been in the way of Hermann’s hands, but not anymore. The Precursors took those away. He felt naked without them, exposed and raw, without anything between him and the world. The sunglasses had helped. They’d made the balance of his face feel right, at least, but they were a mask and now he didn't even have that. The air smelled like jasmine, like summer in Shanghai. It smelled like suffocation.

“Newton...” Hermann said softly. “I'm so sorry. We never should have come here. I’ll call the conference in the morning and tell them we’re going _home_.”

Home. Back to their brownstone near MIT and his dad who lived down the street and the nights that were still cool even in June. It felt like a dream, like something he’d imagined while lying alone in his penthouse watching the yellow light of Alice’s tank squirm on the ceiling.

The idea that he could hop on a plane and just  _fly_   _home_  was incomprehensible. He wasn’t allowed to just up and  _go._ He wasn’t allowed to do anything except work on The Plan. The idea of just taking off one day to go see his dad in Boston or to Moyulan to see Hermann…? It would have been as impossible as going for a walk on the moon.

“I can’t,” Newt breathed and stepped out of Hermann’s grip. He stumbled on the curb and took another step back, dodging his own bile and Hermann’s hand as he reached out and tried to pull Newt back. “I can’t.”

Newt turned and shoved his hands in his pockets, his chin dropping to his chest as he started walking. Hermann was shouting, calling his name but Newt knew if he kept up the pace, he’d leave Hermann in his dust. They’d made him jog when they wore his body like a cheap suit, and lift weights and suck down nutrition shakes. Most of it had wasted away when he was trapped in a PPDC cell, then married life with Hermann had softened him further, but the memory was still there in his muscles. He was still  _faster_  than he used to be, in better shape. It was harder for him to slow down to match pace with Hermann without getting antsy, another thing they’d taken away, another thing they’d  _changed_  about him. He’d  _always_  matched pace with Hermann, even when they hated each other. Now Newt knew he could outstrip him any time he tried.

Newt could barely see the sidewalk. His jaw ached and his vision kept filling up with tears that only cleared when he blinked. His face felt hot. His stomach clenched and his nostrils burned from the vomiting and he didn’t know where he was going except he knew, exactly. No matter how far he tried to run or how much he fought they always brought him back. They always brought him here.

The penthouse.

Ultraviolet was in the swanky part of town, only a few blocks from his apartment, and Newt’s feet brought him there along paths so familiar they ran on grooves of muscular memory in his head. He didn’t even look at the doorman as he strode into the air-conditioned lobby with its golden-hued marble floor. He waved without looking up and didn’t hear a word of protest because he walked like someone who belonged here. He did belong here. He’d been here for ten years, longer than he’d lived with Hermann. Longer than he'd ever worked for the PPDC. His hand moved of its own accord to punch in the button for the 40th floor, the very top because it was only the very best for Liwen’s head of R&D and the Precursors’ emissary.

The world tilted under his feet as the elevator opened up to the carpeted hallway, the lights of the city flickering outside the floor to ceiling windows, the elegant doors lining the hall and his own at the end, number four, ( _the number of death in Japan_ , his brain supplied and his brain had supplied nothing but death to Japan). The knob didn’t work when he turned it. He fumbled for his key but it wasn’t there. He usually wasn’t this careless. As much as he’d like to chuck his key into the river, they wouldn’t let him.

He started pounding his fist on the door and he knew, if it opened and he saw Alice there in all her glowing yellow glory, if he saw the soulless staging furniture and the ring of junk food around his chair and the single half-empty bottle of bourbon that was all he had to take the edge off, if he opened this door and everything was as it was, if this was all a dream and he had never been found, never went home, never married Hermann, never came within an inch of destroying the world, because the plan was still happening, because he’d never been caught…

He would die on the spot. Just let his heart give out because he couldn’t do it. He couldn’t wake up again in Shanghai again, bathed in the light of Alice’s tank with the whispers of a thousand voices of hatred buzzing in his brain. He couldn’t. He had to know right now if the Precursors were fucking with him. If his life now was fake, some fucked up vision or dream they were using to torture him. It felt like a dream, his whole life felt like a dream and it was too good, right? He wasn’t allowed to have anything _good_ after he got away from them. None of this could be  _real_.

His fist slowed on the door. His hand was beginning to ache and he didn’t  _want_  to see. Fuck, what if this was some nightmare and the minute he opened the door he’d learn the truth and he’d wake up and he’d be here and Hermann would be gone and the Precursors would be  _back_?

He coughed out a sob and his hand stilled. His palm throbbed, red from the pounding, and Newt pressed his forehead to the cool wood.

The door opened.

“Kěyǐ… bāng nǐ mā?” A petite woman with black hair and a robe wrapped around her shoulders peeked her head out. A chain secured the door so it only opened a crack.

Newt leaned against the door frame and stared in exhaustion at the woman. “C-Can I please come in? I, uh, used to live here, see, and I just…”

The woman frowned and called over her shoulder. Newt was too worn to parse the Mandarin when another woman appeared beside her and put a hand on her shoulder protectively before her eyebrows furrowed as she took in Newt.

“English?” she said.

Newt nodded frantically. His hand shook where it gripped the doorframe. “Yeah. English. My name’s Newton…uh… Gottlieb. Newt Gottlieb. Hey, I know this doesn’t make any sense but I, uh, was just telling her, I— I used to live here. A long time ago.” He swallowed. “I was wondering if I can come in, please? I just wanted to see the old place, y’know, how it— how it’s looking these days?”

“Are you a fan of Jia’s?” the woman said, squinting with suspicion.

“What? No! Wait, who?” Newt said, and realized she must have meant the other woman. This was a pricey building, not open to just anybody. It was crazy for him to be here. He sounded crazy, they were going to call the cops on him, but he couldn’t stop talking, like he was hovering somewhere outside his body just listening to it babble to this woman who probably thought he was bonkers or like a serial killer or something. She wouldn’t be wrong. Fuck, she wouldn’t even be wrong.

“Actually, y’know what, this is nuts, I’m sorry. I’ll just go, I don’t know what the fuck I was thinking.” Newt turned and rubbed a shaking hand through his hair, when door behind him closed. His shoulders slumped.

Then there was a rattling and a click. A light brush on his shoulder.

Newt turned. The woman from the doorway stood wearing a t-shirt and sweatpants with a sweater wrapped around her shoulders.

“You were the previous tenant? I heard about you,” the woman said softly. She stepped aside and nodded to the doorway. “My name is Mei. Come in.”

Newt stared. Light poured into the hallway from the apartment and he nodded vaguely. Except his legs didn’t want to work. They felt heavy, weighted as if with cement as he followed. At the sound of the toe of his dress shoes tapping on the wooden floor of the hallway his head spun and his throat tightened.

“P-Please don’t close the door,” Newt squeaked back over his shoulder to Mei. “I’ll be out in a second, I swear, I just, uh…”

He froze. The room was unrecognizable. Newt’s first impression was of a candy store on Valentine’s Day: the furniture was all plush shades of peach and white, a pink accent wall reflected against the glass windows overlooking Shanghai but those were now draped with floor to ceiling lacy curtains. There was even a door to the bedroom now. When he had lived here, they had it uncovered, which meant no guests allowed, or else they would  _see_. He could have every luxury in his penthouse prison except the presence of another human being.

The second woman, Jia, the one who didn’t speak English, stood by the kitchen counter. Her hands were clutched around a canister, pepper spray or mace, he couldn’t tell which. Smart. That was smart of her. People shouldn’t be trusting lunatics like him banging on their doors at, what was it, past nine on a Saturday night? She eyed him in her fluffy bathrobe.

“So, you were the man who lived here before.” Newt turned and the woman from the doorway stood with her arms folded, surveying the room. “The agent said five other buyers fell through before us when they learned who the unit belonged to,” she offered him a humorless smile, “But we didn’t ask. Worth it, for the discount. Do you approve of the new look?”

She swept her hand out, taking in the frills, the lace, the plush furniture, like some kind of Victorian daydream. Newt wondered if he was hallucinating.

“Sure. It’s, uh, it’s great. May I see the… the bedroom?” he rasped then realized how that sounded and held up his palms. “I’m not gonna touch anything, I swear. I just need to see it.”

Mei and Jia exchanged a look and Mei shrugged, then gestured for him to go on ahead. “Go on. Jia has security on speed dial, so please do not try anything.”

“Right, of course, I won’t. I just…” Newt gave up. His feet felt leaden as he climbed the staircase. The door opened inward. The bedroom was as pink and lacy as the living room. There was a silk canopy over the bed and a vase of white roses on a vanity in the corner. Only one bed for the two women, and suddenly Mei’s look as she answered the door for Jia made a lot more sense.

There was no Alice, only a wicker hamper with a white cloth cover. There wasn’t even a trace of his apartment except for the shape and the familiar view of the city. Everything was different: the cabinets, the tables, the furniture. It even smelled different, feminine, like powder and violets. If he hadn’t seen the number, if he didn’t know that view, he never would have recognized the place at all.  

Mei stepped into the bedroom beside him. “This is where it happened, isn’t it? Whoever it was. This is where they hurt you.”

Newt startled and rounded on her. “What? W-Why do you say that?”

She gave him a frank look, one eyebrow raised, but her lips creased downward in sympathy. “Because it’s a bedroom,” she said simply, then shrugged as she looked past him towards the bed. “Because of the way you look at it. There were rumors when we first moved in. Something bad happened here.”

“What? No! It’s…it’s not like that.” Newt barked a laugh. “God, you’re making it sound like I… like I got  _assaulted_  or something. It wasn’t like that at all. They didn’t  _hurt_  me. Actually, they made sure it felt good most of the time. They made it feel amazing. Alice… Alice felt amazing.” He tried to force a smile but for some reason his lips wouldn’t obey. They just kept shaking and the words were tumbling out faster than he could stop them.

“I mean, on paper, my life was pretty sweet here, y’know? I was a rock star! I made more money in a month than the fuckin’ PPDC lab got for a year! I got into all the swankiest restaurants, the clubs were  _begging_  us to bring our clients in. I was a hot shot, I…I was successful, right? I  _made_  it. You couldn’t… you couldn’t argue that. No one could.”

Newt chewed his lip, trying to get it to lie still. “So what if it wasn’t what I wanted, right? Hermann, my… my husband, he’s always saying bullshit like how he should have  _known_  or how he should have  _stopped_  it, but I mean… for fuck’s sake, what was he supposed to  _stop_? What was anyone even supposed to rescue me  _from_ , huh? A penthouse apartment? A six-figure salary? The whole reason they did all this for me was so there’d be nothing to rescue me from, so it looked like my life was awesome. H-How was anyone supposed to know? And even if anyone knew, w-why would they help me? I mean, I basically asked for all this when I let them in, didn’t I? Who cares if I was trying to do something good or h-help the world or whatever.  _I_  let those bastards in.  _I_ didn’t stop them in time. That’s on me. That’s… that’s all on me.”

A hand brushed his shoulder and Newt turned, expecting to see Mei, but Jia was there too now. A white lacy handkerchief spilled from her hand as she offered it to him, wordlessly. Only then did Newt realize he’d been crying, that his nose was streaming.

“Uh, thanks,” Newt squeaked as he accepted. He wiped his eyes and did his best to clean off his nose without being gross about it, but it still honked when he blew into it.

Jia leaned in and whispered something into Mei’s ear. Mei nodded, but it was Jia who met Newt’s eye and said in soft, halting English, “Maybe it does not matter if it felt good. Maybe it only matters that you would have been somewhere else, if you could.”

Newt stared, feeling the tear tracks on his face cooling in the air, the pounding in his heart and the adrenaline shivers that ran up and down his body. “You understood all that?”

Jia shrugged sheepishly. “Mei’s English is better. Would you like to sit down?”

“N-No, thank you,” Newt said. He rubbed the handkerchief once more over his nose and blinked around the room. “I need to call my husband. Sorry, I…I’m sorry I barged in on you guys like this. You must think I’m a lunatic. Uh, is there somewhere I should put this?” He held up the sodden handkerchief.

“The hamper is fine,” Mei said dryly, pointing to a covered wicker basket that stood in the same corner where Alice’s tank had once been, where Alice wasn’t anymore. Because Alice was dead.

Newt sheepishly tossed the handkerchief in the hamper and followed Mei out of the bedroom, Jia trailing behind them. She stopped with him at the front door.

“I don’t know what happened to you here, Mr. Gottlieb,” Mei said solemnly, and Newt bit back the hysterical urge to correct the title the way Hermann would want. “But it is in the past now. It doesn’t make you a bad person to have gone through it.”

“I’m not sure I agree with that but, uh, thanks?” Newt said. His nose started dripping again and he sniffled, resisting the urge to wipe his nose on his sleeve, at least until he was out of here. “Seriously, thanks for letting me…” he gestured vaguely to take in the penthouse, transformed and unrecognizable and now home to two women who, to his biased gaze, seemed to love each other very much, “Thanks for letting me in.”

* * *

He didn’t call Hermann right away once elevator touched down in the lobby. His first order of business was to get the fuck out of the building, and Newt’s shoulders sagged with relief the minute he pushed out of the air-conditioned lobby and into the summer night. Sweat prickled beneath his collared dress shirt immediately and moisture stung at the corner of his eyes which were still puffy from the sob-fest.

He knew he should go back to the hotel. He knew he should get Hermann on the phone now, the poor guy was probably worried sick. But he didn’t want Hermann coming here. He didn’t want to see him within a mile of the damned penthouse with all its nightmares. The cognitive dissonance of the sight alone might give Newt an aneurysm.

A few blocks away, down one of the many side streets, there was a little park. Barely more than a scrap of land with some greenery, but it had a couple of benches, and he could see the sky. Newt couldn’t remember the number of nights he’d stopped here. The Precursors sometimes allowed him a few minutes to relax here if it wasn’t urgent that he get back. If he’d been good that day at the office, advanced the plan, hadn’t caused a scene.

As long as he was alone, he could spend his solitude wherever he wanted. On most of his free nights he’d been so drunk he could barely walk home and so he’d sit, his head tilted back as his glazed eyes studied the stars, and wished his whole body could just dissolve and disappear. Just become part of the sky that Hermann loved so much and that maybe sometimes Hermann was looking up at the same time, as horribly cliche as it had felt to think that.

Some days it had been hard to remember Hermann existed. Even when they were allowed to talk, their conversations were always distant, like they were friendly strangers. Acquaintances.  _Lab partners_. The Precursors had done their best to make sure Newt couldn’t remember if there was anyone out there that cared about him at all.

Newt sat and stared down at his hands, rubbing them over one another, compulsively twisting the wedding ring on his left hand just to remember it was there. Then he took out his phone and typed a message to Hermann. He didn’t have to wait long for the response.

<WHERE ARE YOU?>

Newt typed the address and hit send, then settled back to wait.

A few minutes later a black car pulled up alongside the park curb and Hermann emerged from the back seat. His body was hunched over his cane the way he only did if he’d had a long day on his feet and his face was creased with the kind of indignation that Newt had once been too immature to recognize as fear for him, back in their lab days. Newt waved half-heartedly and at the sight of him, relief melted the lines from Hermann’s face, only for those lines to return a second later as he hobbled up to Newt and frowned down at him, tight-lipped.

“You went back there, didn’t you?”

“Got it in one,” Newt murmured and shot Hermann a tired thumbs-up.

“I would have gone with you, you know.”

“I know, buddy.” Newt offered a wan smile up at Hermann. “That’s why I didn’t ask.” He made a grabby motion at Herman, beckoning. “Come on, sit with me for a second.”

With a sigh, Hermann acquiesced, and the minute he did so Newt lay his head on Hermann’s shoulder. Just feeling him close made some of the jittery, post-cry nerves die down. Newt took a deep breath and let his eyelids slide shut. “Sorry I stuck you with the bill.”

“Yes, because  _that_  was my concern when you threw up on my shoes then ran off into the night like a madman,” Hermann huffed but his hand found Newt’s and intertwined their fingers. “Did you find whatever it was that you were looking for?”

Newt mulled his answer. “The apartment is different.”

“These things tend to happen over the years.”

“There’s a nice couple there now. I like what they’ve done with the place. Wouldn’t have recognized it if I didn’t know better. It’s like none of it ever happened.”

Hermann’s hand tightened around his. “That's likely for the best. Would you like to go back to our hotel now?”

“Not yet. We haven’t eaten, and there’s still one more place I’d like to show you.” Newt shifted and sat up, turning on the bench to face Hermann. “If you’re up for it. It would mean a lot to me, I mean… I think it’s important for you to see.”

“Not another crass five-star boudoir, I hope,” Hermann said dryly but apprehension tightened his features.

Newt shook his head. “No. Nothing like that at all.”

* * *

The entrance sat at the bottom of a flight of stairs just below street level and Newt muttered a wordless apology as he offered his arm to help Hermann down. He still couldn’t meet Hermann’s eye as he swung the door open and they entered the dark interior.

It wasn’t quite a dive bar. The rent in the Bund was too damn high for anything properly seedy. There were leather chairs lining the bar, though some were cracked and worn. There was top-shelf whiskey on display and the wine list with more than a few pages long. But they kept the place dark so no one could recognize the patrons, the bartenders didn’t ask questions. Sometimes they even played American rock music from his childhood. Newt kept walking until they reached the end of the bar, as far from the windows as possible, and took a seat.

He turned and spread his hands, and his voice cracked as he said, “Behold, my kingdom.”

Hermann took a seat beside him, his hand brushing the glossy wooden bar as he turned and looked around. Even at the usual party hour, the place was practically empty except for the bartender and a few other patrons lost in their own world. “What is this place?”

“My favorite hangout spot,” Newt’s voice quivered and he forced a laugh to steady it. “The only place I was allowed to be me. Sometimes they let me come here more than once a week and I got to stay until the bartender kicked me out. Those were the good weeks.”

“But why here?” Hermann said softly as he looked around them, taking in the faded leather, the smudged bar, and the dim lights.

Newt shrugged. “Because it was close? Because it was quiet? I dunno. No one bothered me here. Sometimes I felt like I could close my eyes and just…disappear. Just stop existing.”

“Oh, Newton…”

“Don’t worry, it was a long time ago, ” Newt said, but his shoulders fell and he clasped his hands on the bar and looked down. He could feel himself falling, sinking down until he was just one slumped shadow among many.

“Alright, I’ve seen it now. Let’s go,” Hermann said. He placed his hand on Newt’s lower back and it was grounding, steadying, and it just made Newt want to cry again. He ground his back teeth to hold back the tightness in his throat and shook his head.

“No. Not yet. I’m trying to… Don’t you see what I’m trying to do here, Herms? Don’t you get it?”

“I don’t, Newton. I’m sorry. I can’t read your mind.”

“But that’s just it, isn’t it?” Newt hissed. His throat was getting tight again, hard to breathe. “After our Drift, I almost  _could_  read your mind and you could read mine.”

“Even without the Precursors, the connection would likely have dulled by now,” Hermann murmured but there was a hint of pain in those dark eyes. It was a pain Newt knew well, of days turning to weeks and the white noise hum of the Precursors dulling the echoes of synchronicity between them until he was no longer thinking Hermann’s thoughts with his brain, no longer finishing his sentences from across a room, no longer able to see what Hermann was doing just by closing his eyes.

“It might not have.”

“That’s not really the point, though…”

“It’s exactly the point, Hermann! The point is that I  _changed_!” Newt snarled and his throat tightened so the rest came out a breathy squeak. “And the reason I changed is because they  _changed me_. I’ve been trying to run from it, trying to p-pretend it never fucking happened, but it did! I saw it all in that apartment. There’s parts of me I’m never going to get back, parts of me I’m never gonna be again, because of  _them_! And I just…” He buried his face in his hands. “When we landed here, I just… I wanted to show you that I’m still  _me_  or, I dunno, that I could get something  _back_  from those years, just keep the good parts, make it all not such a fucking loss, not such a fucking…  _waste._ Ten years of my life just  _gone_. But it’s a lie, Hermann. This was it. This was all I had to myself in all that time. This was the only place that was even close to being mine and even that  _changed_  me, it turned me into a fucking drunk and a loser because that was the  _only thing_  they let me be.”

Newt’s eyes stung when he raised his head and gestured around the bar. “I wanted you to see the good parts, but there weren’t any good parts.  _This_  was my life. There wasn’t any glamor, I wasn’t going to those fancy places for  _me_ , it was all for  _them_ , so they could destroy everything I ever fought for and kill everyone I loved without getting  _caught_. And when they let me go for the night, I was too tired to fight them anymore so I would come here, just to be another loser hiding from his problems at the back of a bar, just hiding out so I didn’t have to go _home_ , because at home they…” his throat closed. He still couldn’t say it but he could see it so clearly.  _This is where they hurt you._

Hermann said nothing, but the skin around his eyes crinkled in concern and he placed a hand on Newt’s shoulders and rubbed small circles that he could feel through his suit jacket. “It’s fine,” Hermann murmured. “You can tell me. Just let it out.”

Newt rubbed his hand down his face and sniffed before turning back to Hermann, eyes lowered. “D-Did you know, back when it all started, I… I thought that I’d get out in a few weeks? Maybe a month,  _tops_ , and we’d all have a laugh and save the day and it would just be… over, y’know? And then it wasn’t months, it was  _years_ , and it just kept going and  _going_ , and I _still_  thought it would end because it couldn’t go on forever, right? Maybe I didn’t fight as hard as I could have, because I thought someone would rescue me first. I was one of the heroes, right? Nothing bad could happen to _me_. Any minute, someone would come along or the PPDC would bust down the door and save the day, or maybe I’d get some genius plan and crack the whole thing wide open. Something had to come along to change it, right?

“And then… it happened anyway. Their plan, the attack, and I didn’t get to stop it. I didn’t do _anything_. But  _I_ got out. I got to see you again, and my dad, and Tendo and the others, the people who were left. I got to go home after it all. And it was so easy to just… pretend it had never happened. That it was just some weird episode in my life that I can forget like my year at high school or a bad sabbatical or something. Because bad things couldn’t happen to me. They definitely couldn’t  _change_  me, right? I’m still me, I’m still a genius, and a rock star, and a…a hero.”

At some point he’d started crying and it was almost a relief because at least his throat wasn’t so tight anymore, but his words were interrupted with hiccups and trying to breathe between sniffles, and who knew if Hermann understood a word of it, but at least he kept rubbing those circles so he was probably listening. “But they took all of that away from me too. I can’t even say I helped save the world with a straight face anymore because there’s always going to be part of me that wonders if it’s my fault it almost got destroyed again. They took _years_ of my life away. I could have been out there… doing things, making things, and instead, I was  _here_ , doing  _nothing_ , and it was their fault. This was my life, here, and I was… so  _miserable_. There were days I knew that… even if I got out, a part of me was already gone forever. I’m never gonna throw myself into an experiment the same way again because of what happened. I don’t  _trust_  people anymore. I’m good at lying now, I was never good at lying! A part of me… a part of me that I  _liked_ was gone, and it wasn't going to come back. And it all happened here, in this godforsaken city!"

Newt paused, breathing hard and when he looked back at Hermann his lips were still trembling but his teeth were bared as he snarled, “I fucking  _hate_  Shanghai, Hermann. I hate being here, I hate who I  _was_  here, I hate who I  _became._ Most of all, I hate what they _did_ to me. Sometimes I wish the Kaiju  _had_  just wiped this city off the map so I never have to see it again or know it exists!"

Newt blinked, then sagged at his own words. His voice grew small, “And still, even with all that, when we first landed? A part of me, just a little part went,  _Oh… I’m home._  Like no time had passed at all.”

Hermann was crying too now, silently. Newt’s stomach twisted. He felt sick and numb like he’d poured out all the poison inside and left himself hollow.

“I’m sorry,” Newt whispered. “Didn’t mean to bleed on you like that.”

“No, Newton,” Hermann said. He wiped the back of his hands over his face. “Don’t apologize. It’s my fault I brought us here.”

“Maybe it’s good that you did,” Newt said listlessly. “I was just skating by, pretending everything was fine and none of this ever happened to me, not really. Maybe it was good to remember how fucked it all was.”

Hermann’s lips parted then creased into a desolate frown. He reached out and took Newt’s unresisting hand in his, cradling it and looking as if he was hunting for something to say.

Newt sniffled and wiped his sleeve over his nose. “Hey, what do you say we get some food here? I know this place doesn't look it, but their onion rings are out of this world.”

Hermann chuckled under his breath and smiled at him, faintly. “That sounds like a wonderful idea.”

* * *

It was getting towards midnight by the time they made it back to the hotel room. Newt stumbled into the bedroom and fell face-first on the bed, only kicking off his shoes at a grumbled admonishment from Hermann. At more grumbled urgings as the bed sagged beside him, he stripped down to his boxers and dropped the suit on the ground, then got up to hang it over the chair with a face at Hermann before he could say anything. Hermann flicked off the lights and got in bed beside him, sliding beneath the sheets and his ice cube toes finding their familiar place pressed against Newt’s legs.

“Oh drat, I left the drapes open,” Hermann muttered in annoyance. The light of the city poured in from the skyline with its familiar outline. Newt stared out and caught Hermann’s arm as he began to shift.

“Leave it.”

Hermann paused. “Are you sure?”

He wasn’t. His insides squirmed but this felt… important. “Yeah, just… can you maybe hold me tonight?”

“Of course, darling.”

Newt turned on his side, facing the window. The glittering lights of the city twinkled in the distance, golden and neon, their outline the shape of his nightmares. The Precursors had tormented him to a view like this. They'd let him look out those floor to ceiling windows to all those thousands of people with their normal, delicate lives, just out of reach, and reminded him that those people were all going to die.

Hermann’s arms wrapped around him and drew him close, his body pressing against Newt’s back, grounding him. This had never happened, Newt reminded himself. How many times had he gone to sleep, daydreaming of exactly this? Of lying in bed and feeling Hermann’s arms around him and knowing they were safe and they could go anywhere, anywhere at all, because they were free?

Newt forced himself to stare out at the city as his eyelids grew heavy, willing the memories to re-write themselves, so that one day when he remembered that skyline, he’d only feel Hermann’s arms around him.

* * *

Newt woke up alone.

The curtains were drawn and the room was dark. It took a bit of flailing before he found the blinking digital clock declaring it was well after nine in the morning, and his brain woke up enough for him to stop panicking and remember they were at a hotel. A pretty swanky one too, if the thread count of the sheets was anything to go by.

Then it hit him.

Right, they were in goddamn Shanghai and it only got worse from there. He winced at the memory of the night before, mostly in embarrassment. God, had he really crashed in on a random couple? Had he really taken off and stuck Hermann with the bill? Had he really  _asked to see the manager_?

Newt groaned and swiped his hands down his face to rub the last of the sleep from his eyes. He fumbled until he found his phone and shot a text to Hermann. 

<Where’d you go?>

The answer came back a few minutes later while he was pulling on a t-shirt.

<Breakfast in the lobby restaurant. No need to come down. I’ll bring you something in a few minutes, just wait there.>

“Now, why shouldn’t I come down?” Newt muttered, his eyes narrowing in suspicion as a niggling thought occurred to him. After performing the last few hops needed to get into his skinny jeans, he slipped on his shoes and let the hotel room door shut behind him.

* * *

“I knew it.  _Traitor_ ,” Newt declared and found himself at the center of a startled, suitably guilty look from Hermann and the unfriendly glare of Liwen Shao. Hermann struggled to his feet and reached Newt’s side, intercepting him before he reached the table.

“I told you I’d be up in a few minutes, Newton,” Hermann said in a furious whisper. “I tried to ensure you wouldn’t see one another but she  _is_  my friend, after all, even if you two don’t get on.”

“I know, dude. Don’t worry, I’m not gonna make a scene,” Newt said with a pat on Hermann’s arm and walked past him to the table. “Man, what even is the time zone anymore, huh? I’m all turned around. Hey, is that coffee? Halle-fucking-lujah.”

Newt slid into an open seat at the table next to Liwen and poured himself a heaping cup, black, and downed the first lukewarm gulp before he slouched down in the chair. Liwen had always hated it when he slouched. “Liwen.”

“Dr. Geiszler,” Liwen said coldly. “I thought I gave you rather clear instructions to show Dr. Gottlieb a pleasant evening,  _not_ to abandon him in the middle of the night to go terrify a pop star and her wife in their home.”

“Good thing I don’t work for you anymore then, huh?” Newt said with a wide fake grin, all teeth. “It must burn you up that you don’t get to tell me what to do anymore.”

“On the contrary, these past years have been the most peaceful and productive of my career. I can’t for the life of me remember why you were hired in the first place,” Liwen said with a thin, false smile of her own.

“What? What’s this about a pop star?” Hermann said as he took back his seat. He shot an uneasy look between Liwen and Newt, but Newt waved him off.

“My security informed me that Dr. Geiszler caused quite a bit of trouble last night when he all but forced his way into the home of a rather famous local pop-star, Song Jia, and her wife,” Liwen said with a raised eyebrow. “Fortunately, he departed before the authorities could arrive and have him arrested for breaking and entering.”

“Hey, first of all, no one was getting arrested, least of all me,” Newt said with a pointed glare. “And second, I didn’t  _break in_. Jia and Mei, that’s her wife’s  _name,_ by the way, were nice enough to let me look around the place and then I took Hermann out for dinner, end of story. We’re all good friends now. I’m gonna invite them to our place in Cambridge sometime. Maybe send them a fruit basket for their trouble.”

“Yes, from the sound of it, an apology of some sort is in order,” Hermann said in a rush. “In any case, Liwen was just leaving. She is a busy woman, after all, and I’m very grateful that she spared me the time in her day to catch up.”

“Indeed,” Liwen said but her glare never wavered from Newt’s face. He held her gaze and smirked back. “It was lovely to see you, Hermann. Do let me know if you will be in town again in the near future, especially if you come alone. It would be my pleasure to properly show you the city.”

“Of course, my dear. It was a pleasure seeing you too, as ever,” Hermann said and stood to help Liwen to her feet, where they exchanged a polite peck on one another’s cheeks. Newt made a surreptitious gagging motion where only Hermann could see it, the kiss-ass. Of course, Hermann and Liwen  _had_  saved the world together when Newt was out of commission and/or sort of responsible for it needing saving, depending on how you looked at it. Not that it made him feel that much better. Saving the world was supposed to be his and  _Hermann’s_  thing.

“Ok, now that you’re done making kissy faces with the military-industrial complex, what’s the plan for today?” Newt said when Hermann settled back down again and Liwen vanished into the lobby without a second glance, her Louis Vuitton shoes clicking on the marble as she departed.

“I did have a thought while you were sleeping, if you’re up to it,” Hermann said.

“Yeah? Ok, shoot,” Newt said. He took a bite out of the half-eaten croissant sitting on Hermann’s plate and raised an eyebrow at Hermann.

“Well, as I see it, we have two options. First, if you’d like, there’s a flight back to Boston that leaves early this afternoon. The airline owes us for the cancellation so there would be no extra charge.”

Newt nodded thoughtfully, then frowned. “But wait, what about the conference? I thought Herc was gonna be there, you were looking forward to it.”

“Yes, well, I was thinking that my husband suffering a nervous breakdown all because I wanted cheaper flights was excuse enough not to attend,” Hermann said dryly, but there was a twist of guilt to his lips as he grimaced. “As for the second option, if you are feeling up to it, and I mean _truly_ feeling up to it and not simply putting on a brave face, I spoke with Liwen about some possible ideas for how to spend our day here while we wait for our flight to Melbourne this evening.”

“Sure, ok, I can’t really imagine what  _Liwen_  would know, but I’m always game for a proposal.”

“She was remarkably informed on your comings and goings while you were her employee,” Hermann began.

“Yeah, dude, maybe because she was _spying_  on me, or did you miss that memo?”

Hermann ignored this. “And as far as she knew, your experience of the city was limited to professional outings and the few bars around your flat.”

Newt’s stomach twisted and he took another sip of Hermann's rapidly cooling coffee to wash back the sour taste in his mouth at the thought. Somehow it was worse, knowing that he’d been through all of _that_  and there’d been people watching him the whole time. Not offering help. Not intervening as he descended into misery and alcoholism. Just  _aware_  and not doing anything about it as long as he showed up to work on time. “Creeptastic but ok, what’s your point?”

“You’ve never been to the aquarium,” Hermann said simply. “It’s one of the finest in the world, yet you never went. Had I known that at the time, I would have found that odd, and maybe I would have.… well, it doesn’t matter now, but I thought I could take you? Perhaps we could, as you said, re-write some of your experiences here to be more pleasant?”

Newt went quiet. He’d known, vaguely, that there was an aquarium in Shanghai. There’d just been a few other matters on his mind than how to enjoy the town, life-or-death battle to fight the aliens in his head and all that, or at least slow them down. He’d been fighting so hard, for so long, for just a scrap of freedom. Using that freedom to enjoy himself around town, or play his music, or… or visit a place he would have loved in another time had just not been on the radar. It would have felt like a betrayal of humanity to even consider it.

He took a deep breath and sprawled back in the chair. The coffee had gone cold and there was barely a sip left anyway but he clutched it between his hands as he imagined what Hermann was suggesting. A day out and about in Shanghai, far away from the luxury of the Bund and the financial district that was basically his prison cell. Maybe they could get some street food and sit on a park bench somewhere enjoying the sunshine. Then he could tour Hermann around the aquarium, pointing out the fish, taking obnoxious selfies, and getting something good out of life here. Something he’d never had before. He swirled the coffee in his cup as he envisioned it.

Then he thudded the mug on the table. “Nah, I think I’ll pass.” Hermann frowned in confusion and Newt cut him off before he could protest. “Hermann, buddy, you’ve been following me around on this wild goose chase after ‘closure’ since we touched down here. You can’t honestly tell me you wanted to go to any of those fancy bars or restaurants, can you? Ultraviolet is practically a nightclub and you  _hate_  nightclubs!”

“I do hate nightclubs…” Hermann murmured in grudging agreement.

“There, you see!” Newt spread his hands triumphantly. “I’ve been a raging dick to you since we got here and you’ve been a saint. A grumpy saint, but a saint. Do you  _seriously_  want to go to the aquarium right now? Like, would you  _actually_  go if you were here by yourself, or would you go back to the airport six hours early—”

“It’s more like  _eight_  at this point, Newton.”

“—so you could get some work done?”

“I may very well go to the aquarium on my own—!” Hermann protested but at a look from Newt he subsided, “But quite honestly, I would have little personal interest if you’re not there to show me around.”

“Melbourne has an aquarium too. If you’re hurting to see one so badly, we can go there, how about that?” Newt said. He stood and extended his hand to help Hermann to his feet. “I think I’ve had enough excitement in this town for a lifetime. Let’s do something _you_  want to do, like be boring. Computer nook in the airport lounge, here we come.”

Hermann regarded Newt’s hand and the corners of his wide mouth flattened in what Newt recognized as a secret smile. “Oh very well, if you insist. I do have some emails I would like to catch up on.”

“Awesome. Let’s blow this popsicle stand, and good fucking riddance,” Newt said and hauled Hermann to his feet. He paused at Hermann’s hand settling on his shoulder.

“Newton…” Hermann paused and licked his lips thoughtfully. “I just want you to know, I am very proud of you. Perhaps one day this will be a better place for you again, but in the meantime, it was a brave thing you did coming here. Not all recovery need be achieved at once.”

Newt’s lips parted. He was going to say something smart about how Shanghai could be a crater next time for all he cared, how he was  _never_  coming back here, closure achieved, time to move on,  _blahblahblah_. But the words wouldn’t come out. “Thanks,” he finally squeaked out. “Thanks for… for being here. I know it didn’t look like it, but it really did make it better.”

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you for reading. This was a rather personal story for me so I would deeply appreciate it if you would let me know what you think!


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